English Department
Presented by:
Emilio Garcia
Presented to:
Prof. Pamela Stemberg
Class:
Technical Writing 202
Title:
“Rhetorical Analysis of Lab Reports”
New York, United States of America.
May 10, 2022
In this rhetorical analysis we would analyses two labs report that focus on ways on how we can better manage the way we discard used tires to make a new flexible concrete which would help reduce the negative environmental impact of this material which is so hard to reuse. We as human need to find way to be sustainable for our future. The purpose of the first lab report is to discuss the negative impact these used tired and other rubber material has on our environment, it provides better way to reuse this material for better environmental protection. The second lab report show us the benefit or reusing used tires in concrete which would lower the impact they cause on our environment and at the same time help use this low strength concrete on non-primary construction application site. The components of these two labs reports were analyze using the 8 basics structure of a lab report. These components consist of title, abstract, introduction, materials and methods, results, discussion, conclusion, and references.
Title
The tittle of the first lab report is “Analysis of Environmental and Ecological Effects on New Techniques for Asphalt Pavement Materials”. The tittle of the second lab report is “Discarded Tyre Rubber as Concrete Aggregate: A Possible Outlet For Used Tyres”. Analyzing both tittle of both labs reports they both provide detailed information about the research on the reports. They both include commonly used terms like “Environmental” or “Tires” which make them more effective when establishing the main point that would be discussed in the research. These tittles keep the readers in minds because by adding such keywords is clear what the rest of the report would discuss.
Abstract
The abstract of the first lab report indicates a detail background of the materials that would be discussed in the report. They give us a detailed information why with the development of new economic, social and transport methods is essential to comes with new techniques for energy saving and environmental protection techniques in our future. The author also gives us a brief introduction to some of the material and technique such as recycled asphalt pavements (RAP), Crumb Rubber Modified Asphalt (WMA), and Warm Mix Asphalt (WMA) that would be used for the research purpose. They also provide us with a plan on how each material would be analyzed to understand they environmental and ecological effects. This attract is clear and provide a great guide on what to expect on the rest of the report. The only thing that this attract is lacking is providing the major finding from the report and maybe a definition or explanation of what a “Asphalt” consists of.
The abstract of the second lab report starts by stating the main problem in they study and why the lab took place. He discusses that discarded vehicles tires contribute to an important part of the solid waste. These tired are being disposed into landfills without the proper reuse. It provides informative information on how landfills have been banned for used tires. The abstract provides a major finding which is the uses of these tires to be mix with concrete and which help provide an alternative for other natural aggregates which had become scarce. It gives us detailed information on how the tires reuse benefit the environment, but it also let us know how it can affect the strength of concrete. The author provides us with a brief description of the result from using use tires has on the structure of concrete, but it also states that this concrete would become a sustainable source in the future. This attract is solid, it provides enough information to understand what finding we would expect from the report.
Introduction
The introduction on the first lab report provides relevant information about why is important to understand the concepts of sustainable development in order to help the environment. The introduction includes a brief mention that there has been other research done in the past to recognize the impact new techniques and recycles materials have on the environment, but not as depth and systematic as this one. The author makes it clear that this paper would focus on detailed information on the different waste asphalt mixture has on our environment.
The introduction on the second lab report gives us more concrete data and information about the problem. It states that approximate 40 million tires are disposed into landfills in the UK per year. It includes major research on why this is such a problem on a large scale. In 1989 a fire took place which burned for around 11 years causing major pollution to the atmosphere and the local water system. Because of problem like this to the environment it was necessary to find alternative way to reuse old use tires. This introduction gives up a well detailed background of the problem and way in which we can act in order to help our environment. It provides a briefs introduction to the method and explore way in which used tires affect the strength of concrete, but it could still be consider a sustainable option for the future.
Materials and Methods
The first lab report includes do not lists the material at first. The author decides to follow a different approach when it come to stating each of the different type of waste material. At first, we can see a table of the emission cause by different type of modern transportation methods such as truck with heavy loads, railway, and water transport. It provides a problem and solution method, he states that with the development of the automotive industry, a large amount of waste rubber is produce. He them go into sub header explaining the impact of rubber on the environment and ecological effect. Lastly, he provides a alternate used for this material in the case of the used tired one use is creating asphalt rubber paving which provide a mean of reuse of this tires instead of just disposing them on landfill or burning them. I believe he used this approach because it helps understand the roots of the problem and how we can manage each of them.
The second lab report provide detail information on the material used to conduct the experiment. Scrap tires aggregates ranging from 20-1 mm were used. According to the information these tires contained mostly textiles fiber rather than steel fiber. A graph is used to help us understand how the different size of rubber and mineral is used to make the mixes. The author then processes in telling us the different temperature in which the mix was made for a duration of 7 and 28 days. This report shows us the detailed step and it would be easy to replicate the experiment since all the data was given. The author even gives us the water / cement ration which could affect the texture of the final concrete.
Results
The first lab report used two table to compare the results obtained from using the different asphalt mixture. It compares how low the C02 emissions could be if you used different asphalt technologies. The tables show how that the Warm mix asphalt produce less toxic gas and harmful substance to the environment. The data is concrete, and we can easily deduct that is a great environment advantage for pavement construction and tunnels if we used this mixture with recycle material.
The second lab report follow basically the same structure as the first one. It used tables and graph to show the relationship between the different result obtained in the experiment. It shows that even thou concrete lose some of it strength if we mixed it with recycle material such as used tires it would still maintain strength to be able to use in building certain structure of less weight. All the table are label correctly and are easy to navigate and follow with the results.
Discussion
The first lab report addresses the major issues stated in the introduction. It shows that the utilization of waste is one of the most effective ways to address energy shortage problem and environment problem cause by waste rubber and other old asphalt mixture. It discusses why the Warm mix asphalt is more beneficial in improving the working conditions at construction site and at the same time improving the environment by decreasing waste production emitted from cars and other mode of transportation.
The second lab report discussion confirm the result of the experiment. It shows that concrete with rubber aggregate content is higher in mass but could be useless for major structural site. However, the author discuss that is still possible to be use for low strength structural application. Most importantly the most important part of this discussions is that even if we used the concrete with rubber aggregate from used tired at a low rate this would help reduce the waste of tires rubber. The author also discusses that rubber aggregate concrete might be more expensive to produce nowadays this could potentially change in the future as the market develop and we find better ways to recycle our waste material.
Conclusion
The first lab report conclusion summarizes the main points stated in the introduction. It shows that the application of the different material RAP, CRMA, and WMA mixture can help decrease the amount of solid waste and emissions of harmful substances. Which has positive benefit on our environment. He goes to a extend on recommending that this method must really be consider on building project to reduce pollution and waste on large scale.
The second lab report also revised the mains point from the introduction even if the concrete made from rubber aggregate has lower value because of its low strength compared to that made from natural mineral, this can still be use for low strength structural application. This could eventually reduce the amount of rubber waste.
Reference
The citation in both lab report is cited correctly in APA style. The sources are cited completely with all the corresponding information. The only minor difference is that the sources in the second lab report are listed alphabetically and the first one is not.
Conclusion
The two-lab report organize all the idea were state clearly. They make sure to shows the way in which we can reuse old materials such as old tires to help our environment with the use of more sustainable materials. The use of graph on both lab report helps us navigate throughout the data obtained during the research and make it easier to understand the relationship between it. Both authors made us more aware of the problem of not properly disposing old tires and provide us with more alternative solution that would help us deal with issues like this in the future. They both encouraged us to take actions with the finding provide on their research.
Reference
- P. Li and Z. Ding, “Analysis of environmental and ecological effects on new techniques for asphalt pavement materials,” 2011 International Symposium on Water Resource and Environmental Protection, 2011, pp. 3090-3092, doi: 10.1109/ISWREP.2011.5893532
- R. Thiruppathi, “Discarded tyre rubber as concrete aggregate: A possible outlet for used tyres,” 2013 International Conference on Current Trends in Engineering and Technology (ICCTET), 2013, pp. 202-207, doi: 10.1109/ICCTET.2013.6675946.
Self-Reflection
In this assignment I was able to learn a few of the learning outcomes from the syllabus. This was a long assignment and required a lot of research and patience. It was hard at time since you are working with so many ideas all at once. I was able to learn on how to use the research tools. I learned on how to use the academic search complete on the library site. I learned on how to search for a specific topic by using keyword to help narrow your search and research to a specific topic in mind. Doing research can be overwhelmed because the amount of information is a lot and is often new to our knowledge. The harder part about the research is paraphrasing your finding from the actual lab to include it on your own paper. I also learned how to write and analyzed labs reports. I learned about the 8 different parts of a lab report and what do each of them need to have in any report. Doing this type of research and writing lab report is something that I would use in the future. This is very common in the science field. I think is essential to know how to properly write a report because as I move forward in my career path these would only become more common.
